science

The personalism of Cath societies leads people to attach great importance to what is peculiar and accidental in the human person. They distinguish one man from another not by what is common and permanent in both - that is, their human nature - but by what is particular or accidental in each one of them. (v.g., do you know Joe, that guy with a big, black moustache?; or, do you remember Mary, that blonde with gorgeous legs?)

By contrast, the impersonalism of Prot societies leads people to look at man by what is general and permanent in them - that is, their human nature. This focus on the essential, on what is permanent and general, and disregard for the particular and the accidental, develops in people of Prot societies one capacity that is characteristically their own, namely, the capacity to think in abstract terms. This is a way of thinking which disregards details, that which is particular and accidental to concentrate on essentials, that which is general and permanent. This is also the way of thinking in science.

Science looks for what is general and permanent within a certain class of natural or social phenomena. It tends to disregard details such as those which represent particularities or accidents in such phenomena. It thus requires the capacity of abstract thinking and this is a capacity that is ingrained in the impersonalistic culture of Prot societies.

People in Cath societies, by contrast, tend always to think in concrete terms, they usually talk in terms of stories involving people they know and details associated with peculiarities and accidents in their personalities and lives. They cannot think, or have great difficulty to think, in abstract terms. Their thinking is always tied to a particular feature or accident. Thus, in the example above, they cannot think of Mary without thinking of her gorgeous legs because, in their eyes, it is those gorgeous legs that give Mary her distinct individuality. A man from a Prot society would simply talk about Mary, not about their distinguishing legs because - he would argue - women with gorgeous legs like Mary there are many millions in the world.

This difference between, on the one hand, the greater propensity of the Prot man to think and speak in abstract terms and, on the other hand, the greater propensity of the Cat man to think and speak in concrete terms is such that sometimes the dialogue between the two becomes impossible, or at least amazing:

-There is a law in Economics, called the law of demand, which states that when the price goes up the quantity purchased of any given product goes down, ceteris paribus, says the Prot man.

-Oh, that is not true, because last year when the prices of Mercedes went up by 20% my uncle Joaquim bought a new one, says the Cath man.

The conclusion is that, because of the great difficulty of the Cath man to think in abstract terms, science is not definitely one of the strong points of the Cath culture when compared with the Prot culture. (Check the Nobel prize-winners in science, both in the natural and in the social sciences, and see for yourself).